Anna and Bill talk about writing, sanity, love and music, with extra lip-smacking.

Bill Direen is performing with an eight-piece improvisation orchestra in Dunedin and Oamaru this coming Armistice Weekend. He will sing songs in English, many of them translated from the languages of our allies or enemies in the First World War. The songs will alternate with ensemble improvisations on war, peace, political violence and political progress. The evening begins with a song cycle co-written by Bill (Direen) and NZ poet Alan Brunton based on the life of Michael Joseph Savage. Those dates are: two nights in The New Athenaeum Theatre, the Octagon, Dunedin, Friday November 9th and Saturday November 10th at 8:30pm, and one show on Armistice Day itself, Sunday November 11th, at 4pm in the Grainstore, Harbour Street, Oamaru.